This invention relates to use of a location determination system to track motion and stopping of a vehicle over a substantial time interval and to calibrate a vehicle odometer/speedometer.
A vehicle operator or owner may wish to track the movements of a vehicle, or of a fleet of vehicles, over the course of a time interval such as a workday, a workweek or some other time interval, as the vehicle moves from location to location. If the vehicle operator usually operates a particular vehicle himself or herself, the vehicle owner or operator may remember vaguely where the vehicle has gone in the course of a day or week but may not remember the time at which the vehicle arrived or departed and/or may not remember the order of the locations at which the vehicle arrived.
Some workers have already proposed vehicle tracking systems loosely related to odometer readings, such as providing vehicle service reminders, recording information to support fuel tax rebates, supporting entry of vehicle trip data, distinguishing between business and personal travel, spotting of golf balls relative to a target (golf ball hole), recording vehicle mileage in each of two or more states, measuring vehicle driver performance, and aiding in determining vehicle heading. These purpose are disclosed by Peckworth in U.S. Pat. No. 4,593,263, by Juricich et al in U.S. Pat. No. 4,630,292, by Whitaker in U.S. Pat. No. 4,685,061, by Price et al in U.S. Pat. No. 4,875,167, by Dorosz in U.S. Pat. No. 4,879,732, by McCrery et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,046,007, by O""Neall in U.S. Pat. No. 5,267,159, by Fogg et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,337,236, by Haendel et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,359,528, by Liesveld in U.S. Pat. No. 5,428,542, by McCall et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,497,323, by Ousborne in U.S. Pat. No. 5,499,182, by Geier in U.S. Pat. No. 5,525,998, by Warner in U.S. Pat. No. 5,541,858, and by Maki in U.S. Pat. No. 5,557,524.
Calibration and correction of odometer and/or speedometer readings and mechanisms are disclosed by Tammi in U.S. Pat. No. 3,983,378, by Twombly in U.S. Pat. No. 4,945,753, by Dannenberg in U.S. Pat. No. 5,018,087, by Toyama et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,122,961, by Kozikaro in U.S. Pat. No. 5,156,038, by Richard et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,410,478, and by Seymour et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,434,788.
None of these systems fully integrates odometer information with information obtainable from a location determination (LD) system, such as a Global Positioning System (GPS), a Global Orbiting Navigational Satellite System (GLONASS) or a Long Range Navigation (LORAN) system. What is needed is a system, carried on a vehicle, that can utilize odometer information and vehicle location and velocity information provided by an LD system to determine and display upon command (1) locations where the vehicle has stopped for at least a threshold time interval (a xe2x80x9cvehicle arrest eventxe2x80x9d), (2) measures of vehicle user performance, such as the length of time a vehicle has been substantially motionless and (3) results of calibration of a conventional odometer and/or speedometer associated with the vehicle. Preferably, the system should be flexible enough to allow parameters such as the length of the threshold time interval, locations where vehicle arrest is appropriate, and related parameters to be changed at frequent intervals, or on the fly.
These needs are met by the invention, which provides a vehicle location determination system, optionally linked to the vehicle odometer, that: (1) tracks vehicle location and motion; (2) determines and stores the location coordinates for each location at which a vehicle arrest event occurs, and the time interval associated with each vehicle arrest event; (3) notes and stores a vehicle mileage reading at the location of each vehicle arrest event; (4) provides one or more measures of vehicle user performance related to the length of time consumed by a vehicle arrest event; and (5) provides calibration and/or correction for a conventional vehicle odometer or speedometer.